Video Training at your sports facility

Anyone who has coached children knows that hands-on teaching methods are much more effective than others. Standing in front of a group of kids and verbally explaining how to improve their sports technique often leads to frustration. And when kids don’t improve and parents don’t see results, it affects the bottom line of your business – which is why it’s important to keep your instruction as hands-on and as visual as possible.

There are plenty of ways to provide a more interactive teaching experience for your clients, and one that I’ve seen work well for many sports facilities is the use of video in instruction.

Most kids – and most adults, as well – respond better to visual cues. Even when mirroring a coach, they don’t fully realize how they’re performing a skill differently until they actually see themselves do it. Showing them a video of themselves performing a skill is a quick and effective way to illustrate how they can improve, and it also documents the actual improvement.

Mirrors can also be a nice, low-tech option for critiquing general body position or stances, and it’s good to have a few around the facility. However, when an athlete is attempting a skill that requires a lot or movement (for example, swinging a baseball bat or serving a volleyball) video is perfect.

There are plenty of high-tech training tools on the market, but any camera – or even a phone – with video capabilities will do the trick.

Once your employees have access to a video camera, or at least a camera or phone that takes video, you can also the share the more interesting videos on a YouTube account for your facility – or, you can post the videos on your Facebook page. Having a YouTube account in your facility’s name often helps your facility get discovered more easily in web searches, and kids love to see photos and videos of themselves on Facebook, especially if you’re complimenting them on their achievements.